{"id":2227,"date":"2022-12-19T11:07:06","date_gmt":"2022-12-19T16:07:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=2227"},"modified":"2022-12-19T11:07:06","modified_gmt":"2022-12-19T16:07:06","slug":"little-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2022\/12\/19\/little-women\/","title":{"rendered":"Little Women"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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To listen to this reflection as a podcast,\u00a0<\/em>click here<\/a>.
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Throughout the season of Advent \u2013 which this year encompasses the four weeks leading up to December 25 \u2013 we\u2019re looking at classic Christmas movies and how they might connect us to the miracle of God choosing to become a human being.<\/em>

Louisa May Alcott\u2019s most famous novel, Little Women<\/em>, creates the impression that it describes a real family.
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In a sense, that\u2019s true.\u00a0 Alcott modeled the members of the March family around her own family of origin.
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The book spotlights four sisters who are distinctly different in temperament and motivation.\u00a0 They, along with their strong-willed mother Marmee, are struggling to grow up and stay together as a family in Massachusetts during the Civil War.\u00a0 Their father is far from home, serving as a chaplain for the Union army.\u00a0
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Meg is the \u201cgood girl,\u201d Beth is sweet and shy, and Amy is the incurable romantic.\u00a0 Alcott presents herself as Jo, the headstrong aspiring writer.\u00a0 She is without question the book\u2019s \u201cstar.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
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Even though Little Women<\/em> is the book that made Alcott famous, it was never her favorite.\u00a0 She admitted later that her publisher had pressured her to come up with a \u201cgirls\u2019 story.\u201d\u00a0 Since its publication in 1868, however, it has never been out of print, and Hollywood has brought five different versions of it to the screen (in 1918, 1933, 1949, and 2019).\u00a0 The most celebrated adaptation was directed by Gillian Armstrong in 1994, which is where we\u2019ll focus our attention.\u00a0
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Although Little Women<\/em> is not a Christmas story per se, Anderson chose to emphasize the holiday scenes in Alcott\u2019s original.\u00a0 Christmas represents the time when the March sisters feel closest together.\u00a0
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The blockbuster cast \u2013 featuring Winona Ryder as Jo, Claire Danes as Beth, Kirsten Dunst as Amy, Susan Sarandon as Marmee, and Gabriel Byrne and Christian Bale as two of the male love interests \u2013 display what a real family is like.\u00a0 That means tenderness.\u00a0 Anger.\u00a0 Reconciliation.\u00a0 Vindictiveness.\u00a0 At one point Amy impulsively burns one of Jo\u2019s manuscripts.\u00a0 Predictably, Jo goes Mt. St. Helens.\u00a0 Instead of devolving into a sentimental \u201cchick flick,\u201d Little Women<\/em> is a series of snapshots of the ups and downs of real people trying to do life together.

Above all, there is love.\u00a0 As Beth loses her battle with scarlet fever, she tells Jo not that she will never see her again, but rather, “I shall be homesick for you.”\u00a0 Here’s that amazing moment:\u00a0\u00a0Little Women (1994) – I Shall Be Homesick for You Scene (8\/10) | Movieclips – YouTube<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
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What\u2019s the key to doing life together successfully<\/em>?\u00a0
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Relationship expert Dr. John Gottman believes that \u201crepair attempts\u201d are crucial.\u00a0 He defines a repair attempt as \u201cany statement or action \u2013 silly or otherwise \u2013 that prevents negativity from escalating out of control.\u201d\u00a0 Happy couples and unhappy couples are not different in the number of mistakes they make.\u00a0 Or the number of arguments they have.\u00a0 All couples (and virtually all family members) experience emotional meltdowns from time to time.\u00a0 Those can feel especially painful at Christmas.\u00a0 But what happens next makes all the difference.
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People who intentionally try to lower the flame in a difficult moment \u2013 perhaps with a self-deprecating remark (\u201cthere I go again\u201d) or a sincere apology or maybe just a goofy smile \u2013 are making a special kind of investment.\u00a0 They\u2019re declaring, \u201cThis may be a difficult moment, but I believe we\u2019re not done.\u00a0 I want to help build a more positive future for our relationship.\u201d\u00a0
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That doesn\u2019t happen by accident.\u00a0 It requires work.\u00a0
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Just after World War II, the Betty Crocker name was on at least 50 General Mills products.\u00a0 Many Americans believed Betty Crocker was a real person.\u00a0 She finished second to Eleanor Roosevelt in a survey of the most popular women in America.\u00a0 An actress supplied her \u201cvoice\u201d on her own radio show, and her loyal followers could even visit her \u201ckitchen\u201d at General Mills headquarters.\u00a0
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But Betty Crocker was nothing but a marketing label for a cluster of bakery products.\u00a0 \u00a0
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Interestingly, Ms. Crocker\u2019s cake mixes didn\u2019t sell very well when they were first introduced.\u00a0 All you had to do was add water.\u00a0 That didn\u2019t seem like cooking at all.\u00a0 American housewives shrugged.
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Then, as Laura Shapiro details in her book Something From the Oven<\/em>, General Mills began to leave out some of the ingredients.\u00a0 The new recipe required the addition of two eggs.\u00a0 Suddenly the cake mixes were flying off the shelves.
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Today it\u2019s called the Egg Theory.\u00a0 As long as I can add something \u2013 even a very humble something \u2013 the results somehow become mine.<\/em>
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What\u2019s the difference between buying a fully assembled bookshelf and a bookshelf kit from IKEA?\u00a0 Putting together the IKEA components \u2013 watching as the bookshelf takes shape through my very own efforts \u2013 leads me to some pride of ownership.\u00a0 If we cut up a tomato and add it to the Caesar salad package, or slice a few mushrooms into what is otherwise a mere bottle of factory-made spaghetti sauce, we feel a strange attachment to what \u201cwe\u201d have made.
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General Mills ads proclaimed, \u201cWho makes the best yellow cakes?\u00a0 YOU!\u201d\u00a0 You do the really hard part of cracking a couple of eggs.\u00a0 As the timeless slogan put it, \u201cYou and Betty Crocker can bake someone happy.\u201d\u00a0 Any one of us can become a culinary champion.\u00a0 All we need is a spoonful of ownership.\u00a0
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That\u2019s oh-so-true when it comes to relationships.
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We cannot be spectators in our own families.\u00a0 We cannot stand by and wait to see what happens next.\u00a0 When we make special efforts to add something positive to our own relational mix, things change from \u201csomething other people are doing\u201d to \u201csomething we<\/u><\/em> are doing together.\u201d
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The unique ingredient you bring to the recipe is yourself:\u00a0<\/em>your words of encouragement, your assurances of love, your commitment to excel at repair attempts this Christmas.\u00a0 \u00a0
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Yes, an all-powerful God can transform the world and heal your family\u2019s hurts and problems all by himself.
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But if we\u2019re willing to get into the kitchen and break some eggs, we\u2019ll discover that God has something greater in mind than just smoothing out a few family rough spots.
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As part of the process, he actually intends to transform us<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To listen to this reflection as a podcast,\u00a0click here.\u00a0Throughout the season of Advent \u2013 which this year encompasses the four weeks leading up to December 25 \u2013 we\u2019re looking at classic Christmas movies and how they might connect us to the miracle of God choosing to become a human being. Louisa May Alcott\u2019s most famous novel, Little Women, creates the… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2228,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[539],"class_list":["post-2227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-christmas-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2227"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2229,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227\/revisions\/2229"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}